Got Olympic Fever? Maybe it's Zika.

If I was still on Facebook, I'd have posted:  "Who gives a crap about the summer Olympics?"

I went to bed early and  missed the opening ceremony, featuring somebody nobody ever heard of, lighting the flame.  

Spare me.  In recent times the once revered Olympic Games have morphed into Theater - Over-hyped, ultra- commercialized and super-dull.  Do you enjoy watching people swim, when the difference between winner and loser is hundreths of a second? Is Rowing really a sport? Four chicks bashing a volleyball back and forth in the sand?  (Ok, maybe that is worth watching) Gymnastics - a totally corrupt judging system?   

 For me, these hyper-nationalistic competitions are complete yawners.  I would only tune in if I needed a good snooze.  


The most interesting aspect is the threat of Zika, or that the outdoor swimmers might encounter a dead body in the surf.    

Commercialism: I'm surprised Michael Phelps doesn't have a Nike tattoo festooned on his back so he can garner more $$$.  I yearn for the old days when US only sent amateur athletes and still did well against the competition.  Now, everyone cheats, because it is winning that is all-important.  Forget the thrill of competition at its finest.  

Zika, Zika, Zika

Other than Boxing, who gives a crap about the Olympics?  I can't wait until the games are over.


Here is my take on the "games" 

Archery - people shooting at targets. followed by more people shooting at targets. They need to be shooting apples off a relative's head to make it interesting.

Badminton - Not an olympic sport; a backyard frivolity of the rich and poor alike.

Basketball - don't we already have enough basketball on TV? No longer amateurs, just a bunch of off-duty pros who have not practiced enough to play well together as a team.

Boxing - I might watch boxing if there are Cubans fighting USA.

Canoe Racing - yikes is this really a "sport"?    

Cycling - BMX

Cycling - Mountain bike

Cycling - Road

Cycling - Track - Wow! 4 types of cycling competition.  As we know all cyclers are doping or taking steroids, especially the ones who categorically deny it. Right, Lance Armstrong?

Diving - into filthy bay water?

Equestrian - forcing captive animals to jump over things.

Fencing - ooh I'm touched.  They should actually have duels to the death. 

Field hockey - for atheletes who never graduated from high school.

Golf - putting a ball an inch and a quarter in diameter on a ball 8,000 miles in diameter and trying not to hit the big one.

Gymnastics - Girls damaging their hips and backs for entertainment.  They will be cripples by age 40.

Handball - fun to play. Tedious to watch.

Judo - everything happens so fast you need to watch the replays in slow motion. Boring too.

Marathon swimming - Watch out for crocs.

Modern pentathlon - I liked the ancient pentathalon better.

Rhythmic gymnastics - for girls who don't want to be cripples at age 40.  Boring too.

Rowing - good exercise boring to watch.

Rugby sevens -honestly, don't know anything about this sport; don't care, either.

Sailing - People should sail for fun, not for sport.  Most people who sail have no sense of humor.

Shooting - this would be good if they got some death row inmates to chase down and kill.

Soccer - Lets be honest the only action in a soccer game is the riots among the spectators.  

Swimming - Snoozer supreme.

Synchronized swimming - probably more fun than it looks.  Not a sport, though.

Table tennis - ping pong, ping pong, smash.  Been there, seen it before.

Taekwondo- where you can get your kicks if you are into that sort of thing.

Tennis - serve, return, hit, hit, lob, smash.  Kid run and pick up ball.  Seen it. Who cares.

Trampoline - not a sport.  Backyard entertainment until kid damages spine in freak accident.

Triathlon - exhausting to watch.  Tri-atheletes have no personality and no sense of humor.

Volleyball - ok to watch if the chicks are good looking.  Tedious otherwise.

Water polo - a good way to get drowned, IMHO.  Watch out for brain-eating ameba. 

Weightlifting - not a sport worthy of olympic competition. Weightlifters are fat and stupid.

Wrestling - Always makes me uncomfortable to watch two guys in such intimate embraces.

Don't Skimp on Bargain TP

The fallacy of bargain toilet paper:

You save 1/3 off the price of the quality brand.

You use 3 times as much to get the job done.

Why I Got Unplugged

We are back from a glorious two-week vacation at the Cape,  Our rental house overlooked a secluded, picturesque pond.  It was also just a few minute's drive to one of a half-dozen salt water beaches in Falmouth.  It was a quiet and relaxing location.  The  sound track was mainly honking waterfowl, squealing kids, jumping off the raft and the swish of wind in the trees.  No sirens, passing trains or idling diesel engines to disturb the serenity.  We swam, fished, read our books, floated our boat (ok it was a rubber raft) and spent a lot of time just looking at the water.

On the drive home the conversation turned to how pleasant it was to be unplugged.  Although we had wifi access to the internet, the clunky 10 year old laptop was so slow that we were not enticed to be constantly checking emails and Facebook as we normally would. Our phones were somewhere upstairs, not on the table in front of us.  In truth we were not totally disconnected. We had uploaded a few photos of us, savoring boiled lobsters and enjoying the ocean beach.

It is de rigueur, don't you know, to post smiling evidence of a life well-lived on social media.  No doubt our FB friends felt envy for us and our fabulous lives.

It's a seductive idea: to imagine that other people are as fascinated by our lives as we are. So, we post cute kid and pet photos, vacation pics of us standing in front of churches and mountains, or check-in at the restaurant/concert/amusement park, so those back home can share our joy, and, hopefully, wallow in envy.  Yes, the dark side of FB is that it enables our innate desire to brag about our experiences, in hopes that others will find our lives interesting and enviable.  

We copy links from others' that either amuse us, raise our hackles, or -- worse -- carry some innocuous message of hope and good will.  We signal our virtue by sharing any message that demonstrates how morally superior we are.  

I wondered if I would be missing anything if I never went back to FB.

By the time we returned home, I had decided to opt out of Facebook and Twitter.  I confess that I'd been a regular reader and poster on both of these sites.  But I've been increasingly annoyed by the irrelevant information I had to plow through in order to find some content that was  A) interesting or B) informative or C) amusing.

My so-called "news feed" was cluttered with posts from people I did not know or care about, or blurry cell phone videos of amazing oddities or stupid quizzes or... need I go on?  Most of it was chaff.  It wasn't floating my boat.

Now, I know what you are thinking: Doesn't  Facebook have a way of managing your "feed" so that you only see posts from people you want to see?    Well, it is true that you can "block" a person who regularly posts annoying pictures or stupid jokes.
So, you say, what's your problem?  You can un-friend or block anyone who annoys or offends you.     Well, the problem is that Facebook does not give the user a way of filtering-out Friends' activities without blocking the friends' posts.  If one of your friends clicks "like" on some stranger's post, that post appears in your feed.  If one of your friends comments on another's post, that shows-up in your feed, too.

So your news feed is cluttered by all manner of irrelevant posts that are braggy, boring, lame, and uninteresting.

Here is my last post.  They call it an epitaph:

After being virtually 'unplugged' from social media for two weeks, I've concluded that I am not interested, informed or entertained by 95% of the content on Facebook.  Therefore,  I am giving 24 hours notice that I will be leaving FB.  Please be assured that I am not de-friending you, I am de-friending myself.  Please note that I can still be reached by phone or email if you have news that I need to know.  

I am free at last.

editorial musings

Editorial Musings

The editor was sitting at his PC reading emails.   Mostly glance and delete.  Then  boom.  One of his clients – the high maintenance cowboy film director who thought his writing didn’t stink – had written a snarky epitaph to the final edit of his essay.   “I found a few more typos, which I EDITED.” 

The Editor took a long swig of his Sierra Nevada and burped.  He had a reputation for being a ruthless murderer of other people’s  darlings, those bon mots and delicious gems that add nothing to the story,   and a butcher of  clichés, mindless puns, and digressions.    His crimes typically went unpunished,  as he had possession of an class #007 Editorial License.

But, this was not good.  Typos in the final edit were showing up more often lately.  He was embarrassed and grumpy.   He picked up the phone and dialed.

“Hello.  Fazool Editorial Assistants, How can we help you?”

“Achmed?  This is Ed.”

“Ah, Mister Ed, I am pleased to hear you calling. How may I be of service?”

“You know that document I sent to you yesterday.”

“Oh yes, the cowboy film director.  That was indeed a challenge.  His draft was 1300 words and we cut it down to 625 words so it could be published.  We had three of our best writers working on it. “

“Well the motherfucker complained that it still had typos.”

“Vishnu tells us that no one is perfect, Sahib.”

“Cut that shit out or I’ll fire all of your asses.”  Another loud belch.

“Ok, ok, Just kidding, dude. Jeez.   Very sorry about the typos – our spell checker was in the shop this week for repairs.”

“So, I don’t want any of these complaints in the future.  You get that?”

“I promise on my mother’s eyes, we will not let any typos get through in future.  Oh, did you get our invoice?”

“Yes, you will be getting the same – if the thing gets published – as agreed, two cents per published word.”

“Ok, boss.  Any chance we could boot it up a few pennies?  The writers have families….”

The editor burped loudly into the receiver and pressed the off button.  He jotted a note in the ledger and wondered to himself whether outsourcing was such a good idea.

    

Letter to the 64% of US Citizens who don't vote in Primary Elections:

Dear Non-Voters,

Just look what you've done!  You stayed home and let the crazoid zealots and know-nothings take over the voting process.  

If you think of yourself as conservative and did not vote against Donald Trump in the primary elections and caucuses, you are an idiot or worse, uninformed.  He is an entertainer, playing to the cheap seats.  A chameleon whose fundamental principles are as changeable as a pair of socks.  

If you lazy or stupid conservative bastards had just had the gumption to show-up and vote for John Kasich, the world could breathe a sigh of relief.  He would easily win in the national election, and the country would be run by an experienced, kinda dull guy who really could put things back in order. 

If you lean socialist you should have showed-up and voted for Bernie.  Or, if you actually had any sense you would realize that no nation can afford free health care, free education, liberal welfare eligibility and free world.  The cost of maintaining a military presence to keep North America and Western Europe free, since none of those socialist countries pays for protection, is staggering. and you would have found someone more exciting than Martin O'Malley to run for office. Maybe Joe Biden, who suddenly doesn't look so bad.     

 If you are middle or leaning left, you stayed home and let the small number of Clintonistas nominate the Second-Least-Popular candidate ever to run for the office of President!  Hillary's unfavorables are only exceeded by The Donald's.  

So, now the question is:  What are you going to do about it?

Mother’s Day Music

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day.  For me, it is a time to remember those better days, when Mom was very much with us, when music filled our house in Watertown, MA.  As kids, we 4 siblings would chip-in on Mothers Day to buy mom a pot of her favorite flowers - red geraniums. 

When Mom died 17 years ago, her mind was sharp, but her body could no longer tolerate the warring ravages of cancer and chemotherapy.  My sister who still believes in an afterlife, goes annually to the gravesite on Mothers Day to replant geraniums

On one Sunday afternoon a few years ago, I visited a family friend who had been forced by declining health to move to a long-term care facility in Brookline.  He was 87 years old.  Until a few months earlier, he’d been active, sociable, and independent.   Now, he needed help to do many of the things most of us take for granted, bathing, getting dressed, preparing meals and such. 

My friend was appreciative that there are people looking after him, but also acutely aware that his freedom and mobility had become constrained.  He referred to himself and other patients as “inmates” –a subtle acknowledgement of his dependence and confinement to the premises.  One time I assured him that when he got stronger I would take him over to the Brookline Reservoir on Route 9.  During nice spring and summer days we would often sit on a bench, watching the walkers and runners, the ducks and geese, and the wind riffling the water.  He smiled at my offer, but his eyes were clouded with doubt.  Ok, we’ll see how it goes, he said. Then conversation drifts to another topic.

That Sunday happened to be Mothers Day and the activities director at the facility arranged for tea and cake in the 8^th floor dining room to celebrate the occasion.  We joined the group, composed mostly of elderly white-haired woman. Aside from a few volunteers, virtually everyone in the room was either in a wheelchair, or using a walker.  The faces were tired, their bodies bent and frail, eyes straining to focus. 

One of the coordinators said something in Russian to a woman who was sitting at a table near us.  She went to the piano and started to play.  The melody was very familiar to me: Grieg’s Piano Concerto. The music took me back to the good old days. I’d heard that same arrangement a thousand times, played by my mother on the blonde mahogany spinet that stood in our living room.   Watching the woman -- who had been raised on the other side of the iron curtain, but who had practiced the same scales and read the same sheet music as my American mother -- gave me a new insight into the magic of music as a common language that crosses political, and geographical  boundaries. 

Another woman sitting in a wheel chair, pale and thin, spoke.  “I can play,” she said in a soft childlike voice, her eyes suddenly sparkling.  She was wheeled up to the piano and she began to play ”Mona Lisa.”  You could almost hear the stiffness evaporating from her joints as her fingers moved over the keys with memorized precision.  Some of the women moved their chairs closer so they could hear better. The piano player launched into “Love is a many splendored thing”, smiling as she heard other voices singing along.  It was a wonderful moment for me, seeing how a shared gift of music can brighten the eye, gladden the heart, and give voice to faded memory.

Good Health is a finite treasure to be enjoyed while it exists.  Inevitably, the onslaught of gravity and time tears the fabric of wellness until the road ahead seems to lead in one direction -- downhill.  As the years pass, change becomes harder.  Eventually, the mind relaxes its grasp on reality.  But music can be a trigger for those happiest of memories that bring us back to the way we were.

Edited version of a piece published in 2012 in the Watertown Patch

Are We Worrying About the Right Things?

I just became aware of the fact that April is also National Distracted Driving Month.

In 2014, 3,179 people were killed, and 431,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving distracted drivers.

In other words, your chances of getting killed or hurt on the road by someone texting or sipping their latte are significantly higher than being a victim in a terrorist attack. 
  

I implore my readers, please do not read this blog while driving.

No, I haven't Turned This into a Poetry Blog

Some of the fans have been wondering if this space is morphing into a poetry blog.  

Well, no.

Dude, it's April -  which is National Poetry Month.  I thought it would be a good excuse to dredge up some poems that have been rattling around in my "Unpublished Poetry folder."  (There are hundreds)

But after some cogitation,  I realize that it is a gross misuse of the Blog format to publish poetry.  As far as I can tell from the comments, there are only two real people who read this blog; the rest of you are no doubt robots and probably lack an appreciation for human angst. You might be thinking "Then, if no one reads it, who gives a shit whether you publish poetry on your stupid blog?" 

Well, gentle reader the answer is blowin' in the wind. You might as well ask,  "How many times must a man turn his head, and pretend he just cannot see...?"    Or you might ask, "If one is the loneliest number, why must I be a teenager in love...?"

And most importantly, "Who put the ram in the rama lama ding dong?" 

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXmsLe8t_gg

Are you back yet?  When I think of real poetry, such as Barry Mann's classic, I think why even bother?

So, yes, it's still a blog.  As in "web log."  A chronological series of entries published in reverse-diary format.  The most recent post is the first one displayed.  Thus, the Blog is an appropriate medium for evolving information, where the latest news or observation is an update  to previous information.  This works fine for news analysis, politics, epiphanies, great ideas, gossip, anecdotes about kids or pets, declarations, anything that is changing.   The lust for new information is central to the appeal of a blog to readers.

These days most of the blogs out there are just lists of new recipes, old religious declarations, timely political and philosophical screeds, tedious pompous punditry, shocking scurrilous salation, asymmetrical acrimonious alliteration, and bellicose bilious blow-hardery.  

No one reads blogs anymore.  The novelty is gone, except for wonks and choir members who need a daily fix of the same worn-out preaching.  Real people don't have time for words anymore.  Just post a picture, dude.  Give me a headline.  Boil it down to a quote.  

Well, it's time to wrap this edition up.  I have things to do and places to go.  Time to get out of my pajamas and brush my teeth. 

So, you gentle readers - both of you- have a nice day.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZr8iReEqMQ&nohtml5=False

Poetry Month - Death does not carry a Smartphone

Death Does Not Carry a Smartphone - 2011

Steve Jobs’ obituary

was in the paper today.

They called him “A genius;

cut-down before his time,”

(As if one could remonstrate

to Death’s beckoning,

“Not now, it isn’t my time!”)

Perhaps it was karma:        

That final deserved disconnection,

just retribution for the ruination

of human conversation.

But no one at the table

was listening, instead

squinting into their iPhones

reading tiny text messages

about nothing.

April Is National Poetry Month - New system

A New System

Every top-down improvement 

starts with an enchanted idea

conceived in a mahogany walled

nest of ego and power.

A deal is struck

eagles and sharks

shake hands over lunch

nod over drinks at the club.

Wheels begin to move

heedless of the pain

subalterns pass earmarked orders

down the chain.

Like children of the faithful

bottom dwellers suffer in silence

enduring yet another assault

grinding their jaws

mouthing fruitless prayers

wishing some power

would protect them

from the captains of trust.

Dennis E. Noonan

National Poetry Month - Illusions of Certainty

Illusions of Certainty

You are doomed

You drivers of gas guzzling SUVs

who do not recycle

and your vaccinated children

drinking flouride-treated water.

Doomed, I tell you.

You zealots who evangelize,

you priests of the afterlife,

sowing fruitless seeds of eternal promise,

empty promises echoing like empty drums,

you who kill to the glory of your god --

especially you.

And also,

deniers, believers, skeptics, 

fools and liars  --

all doomed.

No one will be saved

whether they be

parachute jumpers, poets,

librarians, lawyers.

scuba divers, reporters,

weather forecasters,

innocents, evil-doers.

All will die.

All, save these immortal words.

Dennis E. Noonan

April is National Poetry Month

Modern Art Modern Religion Modern Science

Jackson Pollack doesn’t fool me

I am onto him and his ilk

with their ordered messes  

brassy bold splotches of bright

as if such a rendition was something

worthy of our notice.

And those captains of trust and power

vested in robes and suits who

with thundering voices tell us what is real

whilst they plunder and pillage.

Like rats in cages we endure the

random shocks dispensed by our captors

who want us scared and sedated

tractable lab animals trained to respond to cues.

Senses rubbed raw, our beleaguered brains

pulse with rage at the lies

until finally, 

we implode into smithereens.

Dennis Noonan  

It Should have Been March

April is poetry month.

It says so right here on the flyer

I got at the free library.

I suppose I should be thinking great thoughts

reading great lines or even composing verse

but the world is not quite done with me.

While idle poets are gazing at the sunrise

noticing a certain slant of vernal light

imagining the sound of wood oars against gun rails

contemplating the shape of lilies,

I am busy in the wooden shed, syphoning

gasoline from the snow blower to the lawnmower

draining oil, stowing the snow shovels 'till oyster time.

Now, plows are churning stones in the glacial earth

fields lay still, in fecund anticipation

seeds and compost, clamoring,

elbowing-out high falootin’ thoughts about

spiders’ webs, unrequited love, lost vigor,

regrets.

No. I have no time for poetry in April.

Dennis Noonan

An Easter Poem

Two Kinds of Wind

The strong morning sun ignites the drab bark

of swaying skeletons in my yard

bony arms graceful in a tai chi dance

harmonic in clear morning’s breaths

a mute shout-out to the Easter Bunny:

"Hurry with your little brown eggs, you little shit

bring with you the heat that makes our sap rise"

While I, at my keyboard, feel the gas rise,

silently fart with noise-some gusts, 

driving the normally nonjudgmental cats

to flee the room.

Alien Abduction

I apologize to anyone who actually checked here during the past month, hoping for some witty insight or clever turn of phrase that might shine a ray of sunshine on your otherwise dingy day, but I have been absent.

The thing is, I have been away.  Oh, I know what you're thinking: he has been in jail, or drying-out at some secret sanatorium, or perhaps stranded mid-ocean on once of those dreaded Carnival cruises.  No, these guesses are nowhere near the story I am about to tell.

It started, as many stories do, on a dark and stormy night.  I was dabbling in purple prose, which in retrospect, betook the entirety of my eternal being  to meld in oneness with the universal embrace of pure self.

That's when the Aliens abducted me.  Thank god they weren't like brain eating zombies or some bloodsucking weirdo creatures.  No they were your everyday Invaders from Mars with big grey heads saucer eyes and tiny arms. They spoke English with a Portuguese accent but I could understand most of their commands and questions.

"Why me?" I thought, as they dragged me into the spaceship, disguised with markings of a green Servpro  Van.  They even copied the slogan on the van which (BTW) has to be the best marketing slogan I can think of.  "Like it never even happened."   If you saw any of the Men in Black movies you recall that they had a device called the Neuralyzer that flashed and if you looked at it without wearing Ray Bans it made you forget what you had seen any alien stuff. Like it never even happened.
Well, that's what they did to me, so who knows what happened after the painful probing? Well, not as painful as all that. You get used to it after a while.   All I know is on the way back,  they took me to a Dairy Queen and bought me a Blizzard.  It was awesome.  They promised to return,  but so far the only calls I've had were some contest operators congratulating me.  I've won a free vacation.  "Who wants to go to Florida when you have already been to Mars?" I ask them.  They respond that they will take my number off their calling list so no one else will bother me.  

I have to take this call.  Caller ID says it is "Unidentified Caller."

Things I need to tell my Grandkids

Here are some of the things I wish someone had convinced me to do in my youth

1. Keep a journal.  It doesn’t have to be fancy, just an inexpensive three ring notebook will do.  Adopt a habit of writing in it in it every day.  Write about what happened to you that day.  How did your plan for the day work out?  What are you going to do tomorrow?  What seems important to you?  Capture ideas, lessons, mistakes, special experiences – arguments or lucky breaks.            [I started keeping a journal in the mid 80’s.] When you re-read these thoughts and opinions years later, you will get a true perspective of who you are, and what your dominant thoughts are.  What you are paying attention to at any period in your life is what creates your Reality.  Also, you will realize how many details we forget.

2. Don’t get fat.  Being overweight accounts for many associated maladies.
3. Don’t let mistakes get you down.  Almost everything one learns in life is through mistakes.  Fear is the biggest force that slows us down.  Fear of appearing stupid, or fear of failure.  Try to see those mistakes as positive learning opportunities.
4. When in doubt, ask.
5. Be positive.  If you cannot say anything positive be quiet.  Do not offer criticism unless it is requested.
6. Justify others’ trust in you. Deliver on your promises.  Don’t gossip. Show up on time, ready to go.
7. Be likable but accept the fact that not everyone will like you.  Don’t waste your time trying to please them.
8. Exercise every day.  Take up a sport that makes exercise interesting.
9. Do not start smoking.  It is not cool. It will not only shorten your life, but ruin your lungs, which you will need if you live beyond age 40.
10. Don’t believe anything your peers tell you without authoritative corroboration. See this tattoo on my arm? When I was thirteen My buddy said they only last for six months and then fade away. It didn’t.
11. Be very reluctant to do anything that is irreversible.  e.g., tattoos

As long as I'm here...

We've all been in unpleasant situations when we thought, or said aloud, "I don't want to be here."   Whether it is in the chair at the dentist's office, or sitting in the cramped middle row seat of an airplane on a 6 hr. trip, or in a boring monthly status meeting, everyone has experienced extended moments when they wanted to be somewhere else.

This is an inevitable fact of existence. Much as we would like to be in complete control, we simply cannot eliminate unpleasant experiences from our lives. More often than we care to admit, we are subject to the decisions of others as to how we spend time.  If you have a spouse, a parent or boss, someone is making you do stuff you didn't want to do.  As long as we accept the conventions of civilized society, we will have to stand in lines, endure traffic jams, go to events that we so not wish to attend, be somewhere on-time, suffer boredom, smile when we actually feel annoyed, sit in medical office waiting rooms, and so-on*. 

But, sitting in a chair in a waiting room, or even standing in line can be pleasant activities in the right context.  If you have an interesting book to read or someone to talk to, the time tends to pass pleasantly.  But if you are alone with nothing to read, time goes slowly and negative thoughts start to take over. You start to feel annoyed. 

Most of what we experience actually occurs in the mind, not in the external world.  Emotional reactions, such as anxiety, fear, stress, annoyance may seem involuntary, but maybe they can be controlled.    


Nowadays when I feel myself becoming annoyed, I try to remind myself, "... as long as I am here, I might as well have fun."    This simple thought actually works to change the focus from the negative to a more positive channel.  Just the mental exercise of willing yourself to think of ways to make the experience more tolerable can cast a different light on the situation.   



*One thing that has been working for me lately is Crossword Puzzles.  Despite my love of words, I have never been good at doing crossword puzzles.  I've often derided my many friends who do crosswords as "having a good vocabulary, but a diminished sense of context."  I never had much patience for completing them.   However, I started doing the crosswords in the daily paper whenever I had to sit and wait for something, and pretty soon got hooked.  I am still challenged by the hard ones (eg, WSJ and NYT) but I can usually finish 97% of the ones in the weekday Globe.  When they deliver it. I believe this is a good example of turning a lemon (boring wait time) into lemonade.





 

The Fall of Humanities

My thoughts on the public debate about the value of a liberal arts education. 

Student interest in the humanities — which include the classics, literature, languages, history, philosophy, and religion — has dropped dramatically in recent years. Only 8 percent of American undergraduates majored in a humanities field in 2007, compared with 17 percent in 1966, according to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Competition being what it is, many parents have pushed their children towards STEM fields (science, technology, engineering and math)  -- fields of study that are perceived to be most valued as careers.  21% of today's college students are pursuing a degree in business. Let's hope there are jobs for all of them.

I wish colleges could teach future managers how not to be a dick, but where would you even find people who could teach such a course?   

One caller to a talk show the other day summed up the elitist attitude of some technically educated  people: "Let's face it, Engineers are responsible for creating most of the wealth since they design and build the products.  All other disciplines are peripheral."

Hmmn I thought to myself, "Maybe so, but it takes an English major to tell consumers how to use the foolish thing."

Skip This Post if You Hate America

Meme:  an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture

I am not sure why we needed the word "meme" added to every day parlance.  We already had several servicable figures of speech in the American English language to describe the viral spread of an idea or fashion ---"Fad", "trend", "craze", "vogue",   to cite a few.  

But some folks just need to show how hip they are, so now we hip bloggers talk about memes rather than fads.

One of the sillier memes that I have heard in recent months is:  "Obama hates America."  It is  repeated daily* on every conservative radio show.    You hear the same rhetoric if you listen to any of the programs on FOX network

Recently, a variation of this trite conservative meme was uttered by Rudy Giuliani.  "Obama doesn't love America."  Along with sly insinuations that Obama was "not brought up to love America, like you and I."    And the president doesn't say nice things like Reagan and Clinton have said about America.
The hint of course is that Obama is a secret Muslim who despises the American way of life and is determined to destroy America.

Well, friends I am fed-up with the absurdity of conservatives on TV and Radio.  Last week I heard a guy named Mike Siegal say that Obama was an "unindicted co-conspirator" in the death of the female hostage who was reportedly killed  by ISIS.  Why?  Because he failed to sign-off on a mission to send US military units to rescue the hostage and some others.  This ankle biter sits behind a radio mike and asserts that the president is a murderer, to the delight of the morons who call-in/listen to the show.  

The rhetoric is more than absurd.  Words are stretched and folded back on each other to create a fictitious meme that has apparent substance but cannot survive unless the perceiver has drunk the Kool-Aid (another meme) which clouds the mind to any Truth other than the party line.

Don't get me wrong, I do not think Obama has been a great leader.  I think his lack of experience as an administrator coupled with some poor cabinet choices have contributed significantly to the deterioration of the US economic and diplomatic clout.  I would not vote for him again if I had it to do over.  The point is that there is room for legitimate criticism - based on results.    

Conservative talking heads seem to forget why Obama got elected in the first place.   A lot of voters felt like we needed a drastic change in 2008.  There was a huge shift of independent voters who had voted for Bush in 2004 but who became alienated by the Bush administration's arrogant excesses in the name of the 'war on terror' -  which had badly damaged US credibility around the world. 
Voters were further driven away from the republican party by the failure of the "small government" party to keep the government small and instead of tax and spend, they were cut-tax and spend.  Added to that was the palpable weakness of the McCain-Palin ticket.  Then came the stunning collapse of the financial sector, widespread job loss, and the clear indictment against unregulated free markets.   Compared to the alternative, Obama seemed to the majority like "not such a bad guy".  
If Obama was as much of a fascist as they claim he would certainly raid the offices and put these assholes in a cold and smelly jail for twenty years.  I know I would, if I was in charge.

Bored With Social Media

 Social media is boring and annoying.

The news event that prompted this epiphany was not one I particularly cared about.  It was the dedication of the new Ted Kennedy Center,  yesterday.  The mainstream news stories in print and on TV  were mostly upbeat, citing the strength of Kennedy's ability to form coalitions and find ways to compromise.

But a few ankle biting bloggers and muckraking radio hosts could not pass-up the opportunity to remind us of the low points of Kennedy's long career in the spotlight:  The infamous Chappaquiddick accident, and several (one might even say "too many") embarrassments involving alcohol and loose women.   

I am not a stalwart Kennedy supporter or fan, but I see no point in digging-up old dirt and thrusting it in the faces of those who wish to remember the man's accomplishments.  It's just small-minded and unseemly to stomp on another's memory.  In fact, it's shameful.

Which brings me to my point about social media.  There was a review of a book in todays Globe about how the Internet creates a perfect medium for public shaming.    

I was unaware of the trending nature of this phrase but you get a lot of hits when you Google it.

A conservative colleague of mine writes a blog that is virtually 99% full of shame.  He spends his day scouring the internet for juicy negative tid-bits about any politician or celebrity who is  liberal or progressive.  His posts are one sided, monotone and cynical.  He should be writing scripts for FOX news instead of wasting his time writing screeds that no one reads.    

See what I did there?  I could not help trying to write some shaming things about his blog, because I --- like every other human being -- am annoyed by information I am uncomfortable with.  We do not change our fundamental beliefs because of the conflicting info, instead, we become angry at the source of the conflicting info.  We want to shoot the messenger.  

There is another muckraker local radio talk guy and columnist for the worst newspaper in Boston, Howie Carr. His mocking sense of humor appeals to the lowest level of mouth-breathing NRA Liberal-haters.  Just listening to a few minutes of his callers tells you everything you need to know about low information ankle biting zealots.

When you read or listen to these nattering nabobs of negativism (thank you Spiro Agnew),
it is disturbing.  Because many of the accusations are true, at least partially true.  I do not know if these guys think they are are preaching to the choir or attempting to sway the congregation.  But if it is the latter, they should know they are creating just the opposite effect from what they intend. 

I am not going to try to educate anyone about Cognitive Dissonance. Look it up, you will see what I mean.

BTW, the same phenomenon is extant on the Liberal/Progressive side.  Facebook and Twitter provide click-easy ways to "share" a social philosophy that you agree with.  Preachers of doom screeching that Global Warming deniers are all unscientific boobs, gun owners are foolish co-conspiritors to every shooting incident, etc, etc.   

No one ends up convincing anyone of anything they didn't already believe.

If you deleted all the posts in Twitter or FB or Blogs that try to shame someone, all you have left are braggy posts about kids and travels, cute cat pix, and boring throwback pictures of someone's drunk uncle posing in speedoos.

It's just annoying.

Aging Homeowners Dilema

Well, I'm back in print, (or online anyhow)  See my latest piece in the Boston Globe about aging in place.

click on this  link

If you leave a comment on the Globe page (as opposed to twitter or Facebook)  about the keen insights or even to add a thought that I had omitted  it makes me seem more popular.

The Fragility of Memory

Brian Williams has had the worst week ever for a journalist. Disclosure of his mis-remembrances have become the news. 
The sudden departure of the veteran NBC newscaster has enthralled the media.  The feeding frenzy of news hyenas is disturbing.  Williams seems to have few friends in the business; he has been excoriated up and down the ideological spectrum.  

Jon Stewart on the Daily Show last week admitted  that he and Williams are good friends, then proceeded to skewer him.

Now that's journalistic integrity from a fake news guy.  





It started with the revelation of an embellished recounting of a helicopter ride to Baghdad twelve years, in 2002.

Now, most of us would have given him a "mulligan" on that one. Who among us has not mis-remembered a key event in our lives or hasn't embellished a story to make it more compelling?  (As a writer, I make-up stuff all the time and justify any integrity issues by playing the "literary License" card.)  

But then another slew of "false" memory situations have been whispered about - The time I met the Pope, Tom Brokaw and me at the Berlin Wall, The body floating by in Katrina, and others that you have already read somewhere else.  Its not that these memories are so dastardly, or evil --after all, no one was hurt by him trying to include himself in important world events.  It is real life imitating art, reminiscent of  "Zellig," or "Forrest Gump." 

So, this pattern of mis-remembering events that can be proven to be false will threaten Williams' reputation as a serious journalist.  On the other hand, Hillary Clinton's famous memory error (having to duck bullets in Baghdad) was forgiven by the faithful.  Perhaps Williams can be rehabilitated also.  I just hope we don't start having a bunch of women coming forward with accusations of assault or cell phone boner pictures.

Maybe Williams should apply for Jon Stewart's job.  He could say he has had experience with fake news.... sorry could not resist that.
                                              ***

A Confession

Have you ever  been in a group when the conversation turned to celebrity sightings, and you "borrowed" an experience from someone else.  I feel that it is time to recant a false memory of my own: I hereby confess that I have never encountered Leon Redbone in a restaurant.  The story I have recounted several times over the  years was actually the experience told to me by a workmate many years ago.  Whenever the topic turned to celebrity sightings, I

Leon Redbone - Never met him.

would trot this vignette out with only a slight tingle of self awareness that it had not really happened to me.  It seemed better to lie, than to have no story to tell.  There, now that you know, do you think I should be punished or reviled?  I rationalize it by reminding myself  that one must never let the facts spoil a good story.    

Research shows that we constantly edit our memories.  (Don't expect me to do the work to support that statement.  The proof is everywhere on the Internet.  Don't be so lazy.)  It's not a matter of morality or ethics, since Truth is what our memories tell us is true.

My point is that much of what we believe to be true is based on our memories of events that we saw with our own eyes.  But if you have siblings (or adult children) you probably realized that there is an unexplained phenomenon where events/conversations that  you recall in great detail are denied by the other witnesses.

The fragility of memory is a little intimidating, especially as we age, where the grasp on reality seems like a small and slippery rail on an icy staircase.    

What's on Your List?

As the year draws to a close, the need is strong in the hearts of  pundits, bloviators and blogsters to offer their personal list of the Best, Worst, Funniest, Lamest ... You know how it goes.

I am not immune to such pressures, so here is my list of the most subtle pleasures I can think of in 30 seconds:

   A cold pint of IPA on draft
   The smell of Bacon sizzling in a pan
   The sound of wind in the tall pines
   Waves rhythmically crashing on shore on a warm sandy beach
   Heat lightning
   Warm Gingerbread
   Wes Montgomery on the radio
    Home-made gravy
    A Summer afternoon nap
    A Snowblower that starts on the first pull
    A clever retort

(Time's up)

What does your list look like?